No hype, just the reality behind the appearances relating to small-everything in and around Albany, New York by a native of the place. Some of it pure opinion but all of it written in the spirit of Truth, good facts-based journalism and freedom of expression!

Category Archives: Ravena Coeymans Selkirk

This article will set you straight on the fact that democracy even at the local level is dead! We are told by political committees who will be our choices in the voting booth. That’s notdemocracy. We are not provided with the least bit of information on the candidates’ education, training, experience, qualifications for the job until the very last minute, if at all. That’s notdemocracy. Locally, and it seems nationally we have become a one-party system in a one-horse town. That’s not democracy. How has the term “public servant” taken on new meaning and how has it been re-coined “self-servant” by our so-called “elected officials? How is it that we taxpayers, voters, citizens are abused and insulted by the egomaniacs we elect based on their lies and misrepresentations. How they, once in office, ignore us until next election year. We see that locally, at the state level, and nationally. We can and much change the situation where we can: LOCALLY.

Democracy is DEAD in New Baltimore, Coeymans, Ravena, New York, the U.S.A.!!!

We still call them public servants but they have other ideas. They have their mega-egos and their personal agendas. They’re all warm and cuddly Dr Jeckyl when they knock on the door asking for your support and vote; they are voted in and they immediately turn into Mr Hyde. They no longer know us! Do we really want schizophrenics running our towns, cities?

Why is it that we continue to elect people we totally don’t know? Why is it we don’t demand a résumé or a public town hall meeting to ask these people questions? Why is it we let political party committees and political party-run election boards to tell us who we have to vote for? That’s why we get crooks, rejects, scoundrels, and ding-a-lings running for office and then you elect them to spend your tax money, judge you and sentence you, to control your lives. Now does that make any sense to you? You are always bitching and moaning but won’t lift a finger to help yourself. Now does that make any sense? You are constantly bitching and moaning that nobody listens, and then you elect people who don’t give a damn! Now does that make any sense? Keep staring into your smartphone and make some more virtual friends on Facebook. That really solves our problems!

Let’s face it, government, especially local government, the government that most directly affects our day-to-day lives, is an abysmal failure.

They don’t seem to be able to understand that public service is not self-service…

First, it appears that only egomaniacs want to run for public office these days. Hardly any of them have a clue about the job they say they want to do for us. Most aren’t even schooled in government and most come from blue-collar jobs. Some are absolute rejects. If they do come from a business background they don’t seem to be able to understand that public service is not self-service, and that the taxpayer is not the same as a retail customer. If our local elected officials and our local public employees don’t look at us as if we’re the enemy, they look at us as if we are an ignorant consumer. The end result is that we lose all respect for them and they for us; instead of public servants we face public enemies—until election day rolls around again.. Nothing gets done but they get paid. Can you see what’s wrong with this picture?

Here are some local examples:

We have a very unpopular Superintendent of Highways, Denis Jordan, in the Town of New Baltimore. The word on the street is that he’s incompetent, ignorant, and a crook. He has a history of using public employees and town equipment for private favors. We’ve reported on that several times already, and we’ve provided details and evidence. He has no clue as to road planning, design or construction. Yet, he’s been re-elected at least 3 times; the last time he won by a mere 1 vote. The town residents are basically to blame for this deplorable situation because they have become apathetic and don’t come out to vote; they’d rather stay home, complain, and start another rumor. That always works in the American democratic system.

Highway Superintendent Denis Jordan literally intimidates and ignores the Town Board, and frequently brings in his own people to confront the Board, including his own attorneys (paid by the taxpayers of New Baltimore. Who else?).

When the Highway Superintendent Mr Jordan isn’t tinkering with the town equipment, which he apparently does for a great deal of the time he is at the Town Garage, he’s using Town equipment for questionable local projects, while ignoring work necessary to avoid accidents, injury, and Town liability. He’s caused damage to private property that goes ignored by the Town Board, and he’s created numerous roadway hazards in the Hamlet that no one, including the Highway Department, want’s to even mark off for the public’s safety. The New Baltimore Town Board ignores that too. Mr Jordan is receiving more than $53,000 a year in salary, plus benefits (many of us don’t have), and apparently plans to collect a pension. He’s just barely graduated high school, has no job-specific training, doesn’t attend any continuing education courses, conferences, workshops, and is generally a non-achiever. Chances are he’ll collect a fat pension if he’s not investigated and criminally charged, and his pension either revoked or reduced to cover the damage he’s done in the Town.

That’s one example. Let’s move on to the New Baltimore Town Board, currently comprised of a Town Supervisor Mr Nick Dellisanti, a boardmember and Deputy Supervisor Mr Jeff Ruso, and three boardmembers Shelli vanEtton, Scott Brody, and Chuck Irving. Actually, the names are not really important but most Town residents don’t know who is on the board so we’d like to refresh their memories.

New Baltimore is a one-party town; Democrats in New Baltimore can’t even cough up a candidate to run against Ruso.

Dellisanti, originally from downstate,was a newcomer to local government 4 years ago, ran for the 2-year supervisor position and won a second term. Barely got his feet wet in the 4 years on the job, and now has decided he does not want to run again. Deputy Jeff Ruso, who ran for supervisor once and lost, ran for town board member along with his sidekick Dellisanti, and won a seat on the board. Ruso is now running for town supervisor again but here’s the tickler: Ruso, a one-time loser, a Republican, is running unopposed for the office of New Baltimore town supervisor.The Democrats and other political parties in New Baltimore can’t even cough up a candidate to run against Ruso. So, you see, the situation is just as we’ve been describing it all along: Democracy is Dead, for at least for sale in local and national politics. Voter apathy has led to a one-party town; no choice. And you think this is getting better?

The New Baltimore Town Board has no balls; they are derelict in their duties and obligations to the residents of the Town.

We mentioned that New Baltimore Highway Superintendent Denis Jordan has been getting away with murder in the town, and the Town Board does nothing, despite the fact that they have certain options under New York State Law. Another option would be for the Greene County District Attorney, Joseph Stanzione (R), to get involved and do an investigation of the operations of the Town Highway Department. Another would be to call in the New York State Comptroller for a special audit. Of course, these are all options that depend on honesty, integrity, and good practices, none of which are to be found in the Highway Department. And the New Baltimore Town Board has no balls; they are derelict in their duties and obligations to the residents of the Town by ignoring the wrongs done to taxpaying residents! All the Town Board has to do is ask for help in dealing with Jordan…what are they afraid of?

New Baltimore taxpayers have to pay the bills but are getting nothing in return except abuse, excuses, indifference, and ding-a-lings.

Here’s an example of ding-a-ling local government: In June 2017 we sent an email to Mayor William “Mouse” Misuracaof Ravena, Supervisor Phillip Crandall of Coeymans, and Supervisor Nick Dellisanti of New Baltimore. The request read:

Good morning, Town and Village executives:

It’s an election year again and we’d like to follow up with you to ask you to please provide your self-assessment of what you’ve accomplished during the past 1-2 years of your term in office.

Would you please provide us with a short list of the top ten items you feel are your most significant accomplishments during your most recent 1-2 years in office. A short description of how the most important of these items and how the item benefits your constituents, your residents and the taxpayers of your town or village would be very helpful.

Please limit your list for up to 10 items. If you list less than ten that’s fine too.

Please be advised that these items will be published. If you choose not to reply we will note that fact too. Please reply before Friday, July 14, 2017.

Thank you for your attention.

The Editor

We followed a month or two later asking again for their list of accomplishments, hoping to be able to publish them prior to the November elections. The only response we got was from New Baltimore Supervisor Nick Dellisanti, to his credit, but what he included in the list was a bit surprising (See the actual list here.)

One item was “change the wording from ‘mandatory’ to ‘voluntary'” in the Comprehensive Plan, changing the number of zones on Route 9W from six to four. Big news, right? A word change! Now that’s an accomplishment!

A couple of years ago, the Town handed over one of the town parks, the Cecil B. Hallock town park, to a Greene County travel baseball team, the Outlaws, who, for their own purposes “overhauled the park.” Mr Dellisanti thinks that handing over a town park to an outside baseball team is an accomplishment. We differ in that opinion.

Mr Dellisanti states that his administration lowered taxes three years in a row but is not specific on that one. More on taxes and assessments below. But lowering taxes in view of the disadvantages caused to taxpayers living in New Baltimore is only fair. But Mr Dellisanti thinks this is an accomplishment worth noting.

Another item listed by Dellisanti is the creation of the “Friends of New Baltimore Recreation Committee,” whose purpose is to raise funds for park improvements. Like handing them over to outside baseball teams and cricket associations? Parks are a nice, not a necessary. Well-planned, designed, executed roadwork is a necessary. We don’t have that in New Baltimore. Effective drainage to prevent property damage is a necessity. We don’t have that either in New Baltimore.

Speaking of parks, Dellisanti mentions a $50,000 grant from our dunce friend George Amadore, to provide “handicapped-accessible playground equipment” for the District 2 park. WTF!!! “Handicapped-accessible playground equipment”? What the F**K is that??? $50,000!!!! What in hell are handicapped persons doing on playground equipment, anyway??? Will someone cue us in on this one, please!!! (Editor’s Note: New Baltimore population, especially youth, has been dropping for years! Who is using this playground equipment? Is this one of the town’s top priorities?) Now that we have physically challenged individuals frolicking in our New Baltimore parks along with the out-of-town baseball and cricket teams, who’s insuring these handicapped people using the “handicapped accessible playground equipment?” Mr Amadore? Mr Dellisanti? Mr Ruso?

Yeah! For rubber cells for the New Baltimore Town Board, and spendthrift NY Senator George Amadore (R)!

The fact that the town obtained “0% financing of a $2.6 million project for a new wastewater treatment plant” sounds really great but where is all that wastewater coming from? All $2.6 million dollars of it that needs treatment. Only a portion of the Hamlet has a sewerage system but no water to speak of. The wells are iffy and most go dry during the summer.The town failed several years ago in its attempt to bring a public water system to the Hamlet. 0% financing or not, this is a loan that has to be paid back by taxpayers.But let’s ask again, whose wastewater is being treated? Interest-free or not, someone’s going to have to pay back the loan.

Dellisanti lists “anticipate grant of $650,000 to reduce the cost of the new wastewater treatment plant.” Sorry, but “anticipate” doesn’t cut it, Nick; neither does the $2.6 million loan for the same plant. Give us public water and we might be able to swallow this when we don’t have to spend $30/week for bottled water to drink and cook with! Waste water treatment plant? There’s no water to flush with!

This one, Number 8 in the List of 10 accomplishments, really got us shaking our heads: “Brought Capital District Cricket Association to District 3 Park.” Yes! You read “cricket association.” And No. 9, “New Baltimore will receive $25/day for weekend games” thanks to the Capital District Cricket Association. Wow! $25/day!!!That will just about cover opening and closing the park gates! (By the way, that’s what a resident would pay to use the park facilities for a private function. The New Baltimore resident would also have to leave a $25 deposit, too..) New Baltimore is quickly running out of parks to give away.

The Town of New Baltimore now has a so-called “Veterans Committee” that hosts an annual — that’s once a year, friends — luncheon for town veterans. The town has installed a veterans memorial at the Town Hall. While we have every respect for veterans, several of us being veterans ourselves, we do question the expense of a veterans memorial at our quaint, miniscule, but cute Town Hall. We’ve been to the veterans luncheon and must say that the organizers work hard to put on a nice event for many of our veterans, almost to the man over 70 years old now! But, really, is this a town government accomplishment?

We asked for 10 items but Mr Dellisanti, apparently anxious to get the politician’s last extra in, gave us 11. No. 11 reads in part, “received grants for AgFest, Veterans, and our Summer Recreation Program” through county legislator Pat Liner and the Bank of Greene County. Really, how much? Wouldn’t this be county and private enterprise, a bank putting back into the community it’s already gouged bloody? And where’s Pat Linger getting the money? From taxpayer dollars! He’s not digging into his pockets to pull out the moula! Is this an accomplishment? We’re not quite sure what this does for the Town of New Baltimore, a town teetering on the edge of implosion and hemorrhaging residents.

Sorry, but all things considered and while we are grateful to Mr Dellisanti for at least taking the time to respond to our request, we have to admit that none of the above really addresses the real problems in the Town of New Baltimore. In fact, most of it is pretty useless:handing over parks to out-of-town baseball teams, cricket associations, getting loans, and useless memorials and programs. Come on, with our problems?!?! Is that REALLY all the New Baltimore town board can accomplish?

The Mayor of Ravena and the Town Supervisor of Coeymans could not provide us with any accomplishments during their current term of office. NONE. Because they have NONE.

The fact is that Mr William “Mouse” Misuraca, mayor of the hovel village Ravena, and disgraced-judge-now-supervisor of Coeymans Phillip Crandall, who has the nerve to run again in November, did not respond to our request for accomplishments. We assume that their refusal to respond was that they don’t have the brains to make up any accomplishments or they actually can’t think of any. Regardless, the bottom line is that the Mayor of Ravena and the Town Supervisor of Coeymans could not provide us with any accomplishments during their current term of office. That’s pretty sorry stuff. But it’s local politics and elected officials working for us — so they’d like us to believe.

NONE!

Actually, if the observable facts can be relied on, Mr Misuraca and Mr Crandall are, for once in their corrupt lives, being truthful: They have not provided a list of accomplishments because they have NONE!

We have nothing further to say about Mr Misuraca’s and Mr Crandall’s failures as leaders; their non-existent accomplishments speak volumes about their failure.

Residents and property owners in the Town of New Baltimore have been complaining to and suing the Town for years for damage by or abuse or corruption at the hands of the New Baltimore Highway Department under Superintendent Denis Jordan. We won’t go into details here because we’ve been reporting on the scandals for some time now. Just search the articles on this blog.

One example of the absolute depravity of the dysfunction in the New Baltimore Town Hall is clearly visible in the New Baltimore National Historic District, on New Street. The street and surrounding areas were neglected by the Highway Department for years. Drainage ditches were filled with debris and overgrown with weeds, culverts rotting in the ground, rutted road surfaces working like canals for runoff water, storm drains lying buried, and dead-end culverts, “Where’s this go? I dunno!” If you take a short drive to the National Historic District and down New Street, at the end you’ll see the result of one property owner’s tax dollars at work: negligence and lack of maintenance of the road owned by the Town of New Baltimore and the responsibility of the New Baltimore Highway Department has destroyed a private residential property. The negligence caused runoff water not to go to the unmaintained ditches or to the buried storm drains into the dead-end culverts. No! All of the above conducted the water into the foundations of the building and the building is now collapsing, totally useless! And the owner’s investment? That too, is zilch.

But for almost ten years the Town and the Highway Department were being informed of drainage problems and poor maintenance. Over a year ago the owner of the property demanded that the Town Board and Highway Department inspect the area and the damaged building. They inspected. They did nothing.

True, the Highway Department came down and dug things up, put in a new culvert, installed two culverts under private driveways, but the bottom line is that they didn’t fix the original problem; they even made it worse, and created new dangerous conditions. The Town board regularly informed. Nothing done.

New Street was paved under contract to Callanan Industries under the supervision of Superintendent Jordan. It cost almost $200,000 to pave several Hamlet streets. It was a nightmare, a terrible mess! A number of dangerous conditions were actually created by the paving and Mr Jordan’s “supervision” (when, if he was present). The Town and Highway Department notified. Nothing. Remember the drainage into the foundations of the residential property? Well, the paving work actually created new conduits for water flowing into the foundation.

The Town Board and the Highway Department were made fully aware of the damage and the problems over a year ago; they actually came down to New Street and were given a grand tour of the defects and deficiencies. In fact, it was Deputy Supervisor Ruso who found the dead end culvert and couldn’t find where it led, and Deputy Highways Superintendent Scott vanWormer who dug up the storm drain buried under 3 inches of soil, remarking “In 17 years on the job I never knew that was there!” Former building inspector and code enforcement officer Steve Mantor addressed a letter to the owner noting “community concerns” as to the safety of the building. But the fact that the Town’s negligence has destroyed the building and made it useless, condemnable, hasn’t stopped them from assessing normal taxes on it, and the owner has had to pay more than $1000 in property taxes alone for a building that is dangerous and unusable. Your government at work! Your government working for you and in your interest. NOT!

Now Mr Jordan’s involvement in covering up a Highway Department employee’s drug use has been exposed. Let’s see what happens now. We’re watching the New Baltimore Town Board closely, and Mr Jordan still has 2 years to go.

The owner wrote to the Town Assessor, Mr Gordon Bennett, asking for a reassessment of the building and an adjustment of the tax bill. Mr Bennett, rather than acknowledging the situation and the Town’s complicity in the damages and losses to the resident, responded in a letter, “the grievance board would be the venue for such a complaint … {I]f you would like us to mail a grievance form to you, we would be happy to do so.” Your government at work! Your government working for you and in your interest. NOT!

The bottom line: Pay your taxes. We’ll provide you with insensitive, non-responsive, incompetent government. We’ll damage your property, cost you thousands, pee down your leg, and spit in your eye. Sucker! Now, pay your taxes like a good citizen, or else!
If New Baltimore had the public’s interests and safety in mind, they’d condemn the building but that would be an admission of the facts; they won’t dare condemn the building because they’d have to have a reason and reasons have causes, and we, they know the Why’s and the How’s of the situation. They have for years and have let it go on and on and on.

In this article we’ve used New Baltimore as an example of what’s going on generally in our local communities. You’ll find similar situations in Ravena, Coeymans and elsewhere in this area. It seems to be a pattern, almost like a disease that just crosses from one community to infect the other and then, mutated, crosses back into another community. Ravena-Coeymans-Selkirk-New Baltimore, plague central.

The problem is that we deny the reality that we don’t have a clue what government is or how it should be functioning. As a result, as the result of your denial and continuing ignorance and apathy, it gets only worse. In fact, New Baltimore, while horribly corrupt and incompetent, is probably the least afflicted of the three communities. Just ask residents of Ravena or Coeymans about their water system, their sewer system, how they are billed for water and sewer services, property taxation practices, building code enforcement, law enforcement, etc. Ravena and Coeymans property owners can tell you some stories to set your hair on end.

In New Baltimore the problem seems to be a core group who control the elections and their outcomes. The situation is like a mini-New York state where the entire state might vote, New York City does the choosing. In Ravena and Coeymans, the lower classes, social services recipients, the porch monkeys outnumber the property owner taxpayers. Promise the have-nots extra benefits and free schooling for their offspring and you own them. Mr Tom Dolan and his cronies have proved this in Coeymans.Ravena elected a local bartender and bar owner, William “Mouse” Misuraca, to be their mayor. Pays to have a gin mill in Ravena if you have political ambitions.

But all of these communities are misgoverned, depressed, losing population, and have terrible real estate values. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that there are more For Sale signs going up than there are new businesses coming in, most businesses are moving or dying. New Baltimore has only the 9W corridor as any potential business and you can count them on two hands. Downstaters and outside developers are buying up the legacy properties and the old farms, intending to subdivide and “develop.” Coeymans has prostituted its unique historic Hudson River scenic opportunities to court industry, heavy truck traffic, dust and noise instead of artists, shoppers and tourists. Porch-monkeys, deserted buildings, ramshackle housing, crime, drugs, and more porch-monkeys are the pride of Coeymans. Ravena is the empty storefront capital of the area, cleverly leaving the former business’s signs up to make the impression that the properties aren’t “really” empty. It’s all smoke and mirrors, friends!

The bottom line as we see it is that local government, the government closest to us, the government that affects us most directly, the government we should be able to trust has turned rabid on us. The very people we elected to take care of our community, to serve and to protect us and our families, the very people to lied when they said they’d bring us a better life if we elect them, have stabbed us repeatedly in the back. Why? How? Well, because you put them where they are. Because you allow them to do that. You let a small minority of outspoken patriots stand up and tell them like it is. If they succeed you’re right behind them, if they happen to be shut down, you run and hide. That’s how we got where we are as community and as a nation. You hide. You don’t open your mouths. You don’t take action. You don’t vote. Your don’t demand transparency, responsibility, accountability. You want to play nice. You want to kiss ass. You teach your kids to do the same. You are terrible role models. And you wonder why you’re surrounded by skanks and non-achievers? Look in the mirror, friends. You’ll find the answers there.

When you go to the polls this November and you look at the rotten selection of recycled goods you have to choose from, a selection that even makes dumpster diving at PriceChopper produce look fresh and appetizing, you can thank yourselves. Our hometown political process has turned into dumpster-diving democracy. Thanks so much for participating!

I know there’s a candidate in here somewhere!(The new American polling place.)

Normally we would not publish a mere allegation sent to one of our contributors but this one is very serious. It concerns the New Baltimore Superintendent of Highways and his poor judgment and misconduct in office. It concerns endangering the public. It concerns putting public property at risk. It concerns helping a drug user evade detection.

Normally we would not publish a handwritten note from an anonymous informer but this one is different. It reports a very serious incident. It reports very serious misconduct. It reports something that is very likely true.

Normally we would not publish something like this about an alleged instance of misconduct by a public employee, an elected official, someone to whom important public works are entrusted. But this time it’s different. It concerns a public employee, an elected official who, like so many in the Capital District of New York, but especially in the Ravena-Coeymans-New Baltimore area, is dishonest, incompetent, and corrupt.

Denis Jordan to employee: “Take two weeks and clean out.”

The allegation is that New Baltimore Superintendent of Highways, Mr Denis Jordan, allowed a New Baltimore Highway Department employee to avoid taking a required drug test so that the employee, who admitted he was taking illicit, illegal drugs, could “clean up.” Jordan allegedly allowed the employee two weeks to clean up and then take the test. In the meantime, the employee was allegedly operating Highway Department trucks on public highways, putting everyone at risk. And Jordan knew this and allowed it. On retesting, the employee failed with high levels of cocaine; he was terminated. Jordan is still employed by the Town of New Baltimore.

What makes this information believable is the fact that the informant knew the contributor’s name and his address! This leads us to believe that the informant is local, and he or she may even be an employee of the Town! In fact, when we compared the postmarks on two pieces of mail, one from the Town of New Baltimore Assessor’s Office and the postmark on the anonymous note, the postmarks were almost identical, except for the dates! They apparently were mailed from the same place. Here’s the actual note our contributor received.

It might be a bit hard to read so we transcribed it for you. Here’s what the author has to say:

“Good day, [name redacted for security]:

“After reading your latest blogs regarding New Baltimore Hwy. Supt. Denis Jordan, I would like to give you some more information to look into.

“Recently a newly hired Town Highway Employee was scheduled to have a required drug test as part of his Employment. The morning of the test, said employee went to the Superintendent [Denis Jordan] and told him he could not be tested because he knew he would not pass. We are told that per the employee handbook, this is refusal to submit to a required [drug] test and the employment of said employee is to be immediately terminated. But instead, Supt. Jordan gave the employee 2 weeks to get clean, and told him he would be retested at the end of two weeks.

“At the end of the two weeks the employee went for testing [deletion] and tested positive for high levels of cocaine, and he was terminated.

“This employee [deletion] operated town equipment and drove town trucks up and down the Highway for 2 weeks under the influence of cocaine. Mr Jordan’s decision put not only the other town employees lives and safety at risk, but also each and every person he passed [deletion] on the highway for those two weeks.

“Had this employee been involved in an accident and injured [deletion] or killed an innocent person, and his blood was tested, it would have put the town of New Baltimore in deep trouble both legally and financially.

“Once again Mr Jordan has no regard for rules and regulations that are put into place.

“Rules are for everyone else but him!!”

Given the information being provided in this letter and the details, we have to admit it is pretty convincing. How would someone make this stuff up? But what is even more interesting is the depth of the details. This informant must be in a position to know these “facts” or someone close to this person is in such a position.

This is very serious, indeed. So serious that we felt we should publish it for the community to be informed of what’s going on in the Town of New Baltimore and its departments. In fact, this is so serious that we now demand an immediate investigation by the Town of New Baltimore Town Board. Furthermore, it is so serious, we demand that the New Baltimore Town Board request Greene County District Attorney Joseph Stanzione to launch an investigation into these allegations of Mr Jordan’s latest misconduct.

“Where there’s so much smoke there has to be a wildfire!”

Two outcomes are possible: Once an investigation is launched and completed, Mr Jordan may be cleared of any wrongdoing. But that’s highly unlikely given his history. On the other hand, once the investigation is launched and completed, and Mr Jordan is found to be guilty of the alleged misconduct, we would then expect that he be immediately removed from office and charged. The list of misconduct is too long to allow Jordan to choose when he goes and then shoot the taxpayers of New Baltimore the ‘bird” as he cashes his unearned pension checks at our expense. We say: “Where there’s so much smoke there has to be a wildfire!”

We have covered a large number of cases where New Baltimore Superintendent of Highways has been shown to be incompetent, unfit for the position he holds, as well as instances of misuse of Town personnel and equipment, violations of the rules governing proper recordkeeping, continuing training, and the list goes on. The burning question is Why has he been allowed by the Town Board to continue his misconduct without having to answer to anyone?

Town of New Baltimore Town Board, Greene County District Attorney Joseph Stanzione: It’s time to get off the pot and do something about this ongoing situation. It’s high time someone started doing their job and clean up the corruption!

If the New Baltimore Town Board doesn’t initiate some official action on this latest report, given the other information that the Town has been provided, we think a referendum should be held to remove all of the useless puppets from Town Hall. We’ll want a town hall meeting to discuss what’s been going on in the Town of New Baltimore and demand that all elected officials b be present to answer questions and to take responsibility. This includes Supervisors past and present, Highway Superintendent and Deputy, Entire Town Board, Town Justices, too! Enough already of the hanky-panky cronyism and the behind the scenes operations called “executive sessions.” We demand accountability and transparency!

All over the United States, in schools, churches, government offices, courtrooms the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, were being remembered by observing a moment of silence.

The Ravena-Coeymans-Selkirk Board of Education Disses 911 Remembrance

It’s all over the place in the RCS school district: The schools of the RCS Central School District refused to remember the victims of the 911 terror attacks with a moment of silence. Even the students are outraged as we receive reports of Facebook posts posted by RCS students and expressing their outrage that there was no moment of silence on Monday, September 11, 2017. We find this disgraceful but are very impressed that kids who weren’t even born yet or were infants at the time of the attacks express such compassion and sensitivity to be outraged by their adult handlers’ lack of compassion and sensitivity to a national tragedy that resulted in multiple wars that are still causing misery and suffering at home and abroad.

What’s next?Will RCS start flying the Saudi flag?

What’s next parents, residents, taxpayers? Do we start pledging allegiance to the flag of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia? Will we next see the Saudi flag raised at the high school?

Most of us will remember 911 with a certain disbelief even today, years after the attack. We all know that the terrorists who planned and executed the attacks were from Saudi Arabia, a country with a long record of anti-West sentiments and whose human rights crimes are legendary. That’s Osama bin Laden’s home country and his family are affluent citizens of Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia where Sharia or Islamic law requires women to be completely covered and still features public beheadings as their preferred capital punishment.

SABIC’s Flag Flies in Selkirk!

Right in our midst we have SABICis a global leader in diversified chemicals and whose headquarters are in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Arabian government owns 70 percent of SABICshares, with the remainder held by private investors in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Cooperation Council countries.Check out their website and tell us it’s not scary! SABICis located in Selkiirk/Feura Bush and has recently been granted substantial school tax incentives locally. The plot thickens!

According to a 2014 Times Union report by Brian Nearing, “Selkirk plastics plant hit with third environmental fine in three years,” the Saudi company was fined $16,000 for those violations but in 2011 and 2013 paid $241,000.00 in fines for environmental violations. But then that’s mere pocket change to the Saudis. More improtantly, apparently the Saudis are not happy just killing Americans and destroying American property, they aim to destroy American environment, too, starting right in our own backyards. The plot thickens even more!

So why are we so concerned about a Saudi chemicals company in Selkirk who, like so many American companies, is intent on destroying our environment and our health? After all, it’s just a country several thousands of miles away with terrorist ties and human rights violations. Not much unlike so many of America’s “friends”. So what you might be thinking.

So what? Here’s why:

The property owners in the RCS Central School District pay millions in taxes to support the now more than $46 million school budget for the district, while local towns are giving companies like Sabic and Selkirk Cogen tax breaks. The residents of the RCS Central School District vote for the members of the RCS Central School District Board of Education. According to the RCS CD Board of Education website, the board is:

“A local board of education is an agency of New York State that is governed by state law and the regulations of the commissioner of education.”

The BoE website also states the five main responsibilities of the RCS BoE to be:

to establish all school district policies;

to develop an annual budget for public approval;

to approve or disapprove the superintendent’s recommendations regarding personnel matters and the many contracts the district must enter;

to review courses of study and textbooks;

to act as a two-way communications link between residents and the superintendent

The site also states that: “The decisions of your elected board of education affect your child, your child’s future, your tax rate, and the well-being of your community.”

RCS BoE President James Latter is a SABIC Employee; Jason Hyslop, a BoE member is a SABIC Employee!!!

In 2013, we published two articles on this blog with very serious warnings: James Latter: Why He’s A Bad Choice and Latter-Hyslop-Brown: The VERY WRONG Choice! but somehow Latter and Hyslop got elected to the board, and it’s been downhill ever since. You see, both James Latter, RCS BoE president, and Jason Hyslop are employees of SABIC. Where do you think their loyalties lie? In their paychecks or in the interests of the school district?

So now you have two RCS Central School District Board of Education members, its president, James Latter, and a sitting board member, Jason Hyslop, both employees of Saudi-owned SABIC, “establishing school district polices” and to “review courses of study and textbooks“, and keep in mind that, according to the Board’s own statement, “the decisions of your elected board of education affect your child, your child’s future, your tax rate, and the well-being of your community.”

So now that we have informed you AGAINthat you have two SABIClackies on your board of education and you put them there, we hope that at the next meeting you will propose that courses for conversational Arabic be offered the elementary, middle and high school curriculums, because you’re going to need it to pledge allegiance to the Saudi flag. After all, the RCS CD Board of Education does establish all school district policies and their decisions affect your children, your child’s future, and the well-being of your community.

So why do you think there was no moment of silence in RCS schools on September 11, 2017? Do we really have to answer that question?

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT

Campaign to Remove from Public OfficeTown of New Baltimore Highway SuperintendentDenis Jordan
and to prevent his running for public office in future

We have been informed that there is a campaign being organized by residents and taxpayers of the Town of New Baltimore, County of Greene, New York, to collect and organize information and evidence to be used in support of an action to remove New Baltimore Superintendent of Highways, Denis Jordan.

For some time now Jordan has been the subject of numerous complaints and claims by residents of New Baltimore submitted to the Town Board of the Town of New Baltimore, but to date those complaints and claims have not been organized. This has all changed with some recent developments in the town, where Denis Jordan has finally crossed the line.

Taxpayers and Residents of the Town of New Baltimore are up in arms and claiming that Jordan:

Has abused and abuses his office and authority

Is unqualified and incompetent to hold the office of Town Highway Superintendent

Has abused his discretionary authorities as Town Highway Superintendent

Has shown special favoritism to select residents while abusing other residents in the context of his public office

As the result of the above has wasted public resources and obstructed the operation of good stewardship in New Baltimore Town government

Has abused employees of the New Baltimore Highways Department

Has exposed the Town of New Baltimore and its residents and taxpayers to unnecessary and burdensome legal actions and lawsuits

Causing damage to private property with a wanton indifference, and failure to respond to notifications of dangerous situations

Jordan has an established pattern of intimidation and bullying among Highway Department employees

Because of all of the above, Mr Jordan has placed the Town of New Baltimore at risk of losing its insurance coverage or being placed in a higher risk classification, which will result in additional expense and even reduced coverage of the Town of New Baltimore.

This list is not complete or exhaustive, since we are now on the track of investigating Mr Jordan and his dealings with local contracting companies, including Callanan Industries, Peckham Materials Corp. companies that have already been associated with Jordan’s questionable practices, and others, in the public bidding processes, the planning and execution of roadwork, and the estimation of materials used in those projects. The picture is very grim from what we have been able to glean even at short notice. (Editor’s Note: We’ve requested the bids and the background facts as well as the estimates of materials and the actual materials used by Callanan. We expect to prove serious criminal activity.)

According to informed and reliable sources, Mr Jordan’s recent escapades and incompetence in conjunction with Callanan Industries’ “successful” but totally botched bid to execute repaving of streets in the Hamlet of New Baltimore, the Highway Department has been deluged with complaints from irate and angry residents complaining of the poor quality or disastrous effects of the work done by Callanan under Mr Jordan’s supervision.

In fact, on Monday, June 26, 2017, when Callanan crews were paving New Street and Madison Avenue, while New Baltimore crews were standing around counting farts on the corner of Madison Avenue and Rt 144, Mr Jordan left early, at around 3:00 p.m., to attend a wake. The wake was for a local but not a relative or close friend of Jordan, which raises the important question of: Couldn’t Jordan have stayed to supervise his contractors work on an important repaving project and stil paid his respects to the family of the deceased? After all, he could have left when the crews left at around 4:30, and had plenty of time to prepare for the wake, which certainly ran until at least 7 p.m. Shows where his priorities are.

Suspicion was cast on Jordan’s re-election and his win over his former deputy highway superintendent Alan vanWormer; vanWormer lost the election by 1 (ONE!) vote. The election was not contested, which raised suspicions in the New Baltimore community.

We support the residents and taxpayers of New Baltimore in their efforts to clean up local government and to remove corruption, incompetence and crookedness. We urge all of our readers to support those courageous residents and taxpayers seeking to remove Jordan from office and to better local government and quality of life.

I you have any information or a complaint or know of anyone who has information about Jordan or wishes to file a complaint, we are here to assist you. Please contact us directly at rcs.confidential@gmail.com or write to us c/o P.O. Box 422, New Baltimore, New York 12124. All contacts will be strictly confidential and no information identifying you will be shared or published without your express written permission. We also encourage you to leave a comment telling all of our readers about any of your experiences with the New Baltimore Highway Department or Mr Jordan.

Recent roadwork done by Callanan Industries done under t he direct authority and supervision by Mr Jordan has generated a deluge of complaints and general dissatisfaction. According to a well informed and reliable source, the New Baltimore Highway Department has received numerous telephone complaints about the shoddy work done. Rather than call the Highway Department, where it is almost certain that your complaint will be lost in the dust, we recommend you make your complaint known via this blog, and then to write directly to the New Baltimore Town Board. That way you’ll be heard.

Please share this information with your family, friends and neighbors. It’s our duty and obligation to ensure that our New Baltimore community is a model of good government, honest and competent elected officials and public employees, and that our sense of community stands as an example for our surrounding communities. Your contribution to this effort will put all questionable and corrupt elected officials and public employees on notice that we will not tolerate ignorance, indifference, incompetence or dishonesty being paid for with our tax dollars.

Is Church Playing the New Lowest Common Denominator; Sending Mixed Messages? Or no real message at all?

Is the Church missing the bus? Sending the wrong messages?

Passing through some of our local communities, I frequently notice churches, that is, the physical building, the places of worship, and what characterizes them. The structure, the upkeep, the appearances, the messages posted outside; these say a lot about the people these brick and mortar structure, symbolic representatives of the beliefs and communities they claim they serve. I often see the trite clichés like “God is home, come on in!” or “Be yourself; everyone else is taken” and similar trite slogans. Apparently the Roman Catholic Churches in this area, Ravena and Coxsackie, NY, have given up on being taken seriously so now these parish leaders, the pastors, have to play cool cutsie, mimicking their Protestant and Reformist cohorts. Such silliness simply degrades the sacred space and makes idiots of those few who still frequent them.

This is particularly the case when a new pastor tries to become too popular too fast for too many of the wrong reasons. He starts to get sloppy in his role as spiritual leader and too cozy with the local in-crowds. A leader doesn’t have to be a friend and he doesn’t have to entertain. He has to lead. So, as I drive through the aging, geriatric, brown collar community of Ravena, New York, the local Roman Catholic Church, St Patrick’s, catches my attention. How?

Well, some time ago I was surprised to see a folding sign board placed in front of St Patrick’s Roman Catholic Church in Ravena, on Main Street. It was last Fall and said something like “Leaves fall but Christ doesn’t”. My first thought was that it was rather silly, rather odd. Something I’d expect from some failing Protestant denomination, or some storefront church whose pastor has no other training than what he received in jail, where he got his certificate in Bible Studies from Dumbass Bible Institute or wherever. I knew the pastor at St Pats was one of the young bloods recently ordained, Scott Vandermeer, in his thirties, a journalism degree, able to move around without a walker, he was somewhat more promising than his predecessors, all aging or decrepit, failing, burnt out or uninterested, all cut from the Hubbard School of Ultraliberal Hacks. Careerists. Our hope never failing and our realism always on the watch, we even wrote to Vandermeer offering him help and support. It soon proved that he was going to be just another narcissist; he never responded to our letter. Here we go again!

Soon the signs started going up and were getting weirder and weirder, perhaps because they were cleverly done so as to appeal to the intellectual depths of darkness of the local community. One that appeared:

The sign above is stupid because St Pats does not have a soup kitchen or a food pantry. So not only is the sign a bit idiotic, to anyone not familiar with the local intelligence level, it’s misleading. [Editor’s note: Vanderveer is “out of the country” at the time of this writing and apparently will not be back for another 2-3 weeks, so we could not reach him for comment. Nor did we receive a response from his office staff.] That really doesn’t matter because it does get worse. Some local in a feeble attempt to put some meaning in his or her life, and for a minute of local fame, placed the “?” on the sign making it even more ridiculous. No one in the parish, not even the absent pastor, seems to have noticed…or cared.

More recently, that is, several weeks ago we again drove by and saw that the sign had been changed to something quite new:

Is a feeble-minded, scandal-plagued Church is going to make the nation strong again?

This time Mr VanDerveer is apparently making a statement that the Church has something to do with the characteristics of the nation, presumably the nation known as the United States, since we are not aware of any Scriptural or Doctrinal references that would support such a statement. It used to be that strong men made strong nations, then strong families but with the castration of the American male and the virilization of the American female, together with the decline and demise of the American family, it seems that a feeble-minded, scandal-plagued Church is going to make the nation strong again. If this notion was part of the preaching series offered by Vanderveer, we are really sorry we missed his performance. But by any standard, given the Separation Clause and the hesitance of government generally or any of its branches specifically to enter into any discussion of a collaboration between Church and state, this statement seems to indicate that Mr VanDerveer is either ignorant or has a boundaries problem. While the Church and churches, that is, the Roman Catholic and Christian tradition — by division and internecine conflict — has been losing ground since the 16th century, it would seem that Mr VanDerveer and his keepers would be better advised to concentrate on good preaching and catechesis, fostering interdenominational dialogue and collaboration, reaching out to local opinion leaders rather than making an untenable and unsubstantiated statement like “A strong church [=] a strong nation.” No matter how you analyze such a statement, logically, theologically, socially, or politically it fails. The Church would be well advised to steer clear of politics — and fallacious logic —; a mere parish priest has no business making such statements and should be reprimanded for having done so. It’s irresponsible, insupportable, fallacious, and is simply not official Church teaching. Politics should be kept out of the pulpit and away from the front of the church — or it should be left to the bishops who are the sole church officials authorized by Rome to make asses of themselves.. Mr VanDerveer should be spending more time preaching that strong family values and morality make for a strong nation; sharing Sunday family dinner together without smartphones might be a start. Getting rid of fidget spinners and Facebook, replacing them with a print book, perhaps St Augustine’s Confessions, in the schools would be a great move, too. But the Church has failed in that teaching, too, and in getting that message across to the community.

An half hour for God and 3 hours for the ball game seems like a fair deal for most Catholics.

Instead, the Church and its agents, VanDerveer’s colleagues, superiors, and minions, have prostituted the Church, mistaught and continue to pervert doctrine, dogma, and promote error, and have reduced preaching to a 5 minute commentary so that the so-called “faithful” can get there and out the door with 30-45 minutes at most. After all, a half hour for God and 3 hours for the ball game seems like a fair deal for most Catholics.

Get the ^%$# out of the way! I’ll be late for worship…and the game!

The latest stupidity to be posted in front of St Patrick’s Roman Catholic Church apparently has to do with the Biblical myth of Noah and the Deluge found in Genesis, or we may be wrong and VanDerveer’s referring more likely to the bizarre interpretation of the myth provided in the movie, Noah (2014) but here’s the official Biblical version:

“The Lord then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, and also seven pairs of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.” (Gen 7:2-4)

Actually, someone should have whacked the one who thought these signs were appropriate! Never mind the mosquitoes. We don’t recall any specific reference to mosquitoes in Genesis (nor in any part of the Bible) nor any cameo appearance of mosquitoes in the film Noah. Perhaps Vanderveer can help us with that one. We do tend to have our facts straight on this blog so we’re reasonably certain that there were no mosquitoes involved. The only other possibility we can think of is that one of Vanderveer’s Scriptural Studies instructors at seminary came upon some previously unknown Biblical text that tells the story of Noah and the mosquitoes. Whatever the story behind it, Vanderveer appears to believe the story. Why else would he publicly post something like that in front of his church? It seems the “unclean animals” were sent either to Roman Catholic seminary or to Ravena-Coeymans after leaving the Ark. We have no record of where the “two mosquitoes” went after having escaped being swatted.

A Pleasant Anecdote

While I photographing one of the signs, a St Patrick’s parishioner was approaching the church to attend a meeting, and stopped to chat when she observed me taking the photographs. She commented how interesting the signs were and how they got your attention. I responded very bluntly that they were not interesting; they were a disgrace and were demeaning to the sacred place they were disgracing. I did agree that they got your attention but for the wrong reasons. I admitted to her that I was taking the photo not because I found them attractive, funny or pithy but because they got my interest, and that was not good.

The parishioner was very interested in what we had to say and very gracious, too. We discussed a number problems with the Church, the parish, and local politics. All in all, it was a positive exchange that started on a negative footing.

Shows you that there are still some good, sensible people in the Ravena-Coeymans-Selkirk community; all too few, though.

Contrary to what you have been told or led to believe, dear readers, churches are not where God lives [Thank God!], that is, churches are not God’s personal primary residence, they are sacred spaces where we can find safe, quiet space to reflect, meditate, be still, or engage in a conversation with the Divine, a practice what we call prayer, but have forgotten – or never knew how to do. Nowadays most conversations with God turn out to be like conversations with those twits exercising their thumbs on an electronic device; a meeting where God’s trying to reveal himself to the twit who’s functioning with half a hemisphere, wondering whose reflection it is in the smartphone screen.

Repurposing Our Churches

When I hear of closure of churches, merging of congregations, sale of church property, conversions of churches to art galleries, restaurants, even private residences, I feel a cold shudder. These churches have become like dinosaurs; they were once living, awesome organisms, and they thrived and nurtured similar life but at some time long ago they became sick, languished and died. Now all we have left of them are lumps of rock we gawk at in museums or use as paperweights in our studies. So, too, many of our former sacred spaces are now secular spaces where the inhabiting materialist-consumerists worship their new idols: mega-flat screens, surround sound, a nymph, and a bottle. Happy worshipping!

We’ve replaced God there too with some idol like money, sex, a car, or a pop star

So where has God gone once evicted? God’s where he’s always been: in the dark silent depths of our hearts, unless we’ve replaced God there too with some idol like money, sex, a car, a political figure or a pop star. Yes, Idolaters of Ubiquitous White Noise and Distractions, the Ultimate Truth still lies hidden in that wet, fertile, darkness deep within a human being (No, not a vagina!) but nowadays who among you Vessels of Clay with your stymied white-cane spirituality would dare explore the silence within, when there’s so much to do in the world? Why would anyone want to become acquainted with their true self when they can invent another, more pleasant, acceptable self and one that you can transform it at any time using a convenient app? Who will know? You will. But you don’t care because you’ve been diving down that slippery slope for so long you wouldn’t know your true self if you tripped over it!

In my meanderings I spend time in churches, at meetings and conferences, on Internet forums, at monasteries, interacting with others in a variety of settings. I note the anxiety and the vulnerability that cripples so many people; I note their white-cane spirituality, blindly pursuing some sort of agenda-seeking-to-become-a-religion, a tool for a virtual life; they have no real life. I listen to and become offended by the ignorance and narcissism of those claiming to be called to a vocation, as clergy, as lay religious, as lay ministers in churches, congregations, parishes; I frequently observe the infantile fascination of the unwashed when, in a strange ecstasy of voyeurism, they rub shoulders with monks, priests, nuns, or spiritual leaders, and they grin idiotically as if caught in an act of masturbation. “Hee, hee! Look at me!” Narcissism, too, is a form of idolatry. I have to wonder whether the gawkers or the gawkees actually realize the pitiable dynamic going on. It’s rather like the voyeurism of social media but worse. Worse because the so-called spiritual leaders are actually enjoying the worship, and the egos soar – and the wound deepens and festers, poisoning the entire mystical body.

Starving? Tail’s great!

And like starving rats will go for anything that smacks of survival…

If churches and faith communities are hemorrhaging members, the religious vocations are dwindling into membership cachexia. And like starving rats will go for anything that smacks of survival. For several decades now, the materialist consumerism and the dumbing down of society has left the message of higher truths and spirituality to languish in the shadow of anti-human propaganda, corporate greed, political narcissism, social confusion, despair and anxiety. Fear of loss is the underlying message everywhere we look. That fear is nourished by the messages we receive of time running out for something, anything, everything; fear the terror threat, fear the coming rain or snow showers, fear the threat represented by the guy next door, fear the North Koreans, fear the Russians, fear the illegals. What we need to fear is the false teaching in the poor preaching, we need to fear the pulpit politics, we need to fear the bigoted perp patrols.

Stuck somewhere in a learning curve…

The only religion that’s growing these days is Islam and our response is to demonize it

We are stuck somewhere in a learning curve. But where? We need to learn to fear our own demise and ignorance thanks to the conflicting and contradicting messages we receive from the media, the poor performance of our education institutions, and the dishonesty and corruption of our political system. Add to that the failure of our Judeo-Christian religious institutions to teach correct doctrine and dogma, and to provide effective preaching in support of implementing doctrine and dogma into our day-to-day lives in furtherance of “happiness” and a “good end.” And it’s no wonder people are despairing and anxious. The only religion that’s growing these days is Islam and our response is to demonize it as a bunch of whacko terrorists. Doesn’t anyone see where this is leading? Why can’t religious institutions join together to combat the capitalist propaganda drowning us in a sea of lies and hate?But then, when I was a kid it was the Roman Catholics and Protestants killing each other. Only the bigotry and creeds have remained the same; only the faces have changed.

Cultural and political institutions our religious and faith institutions are appealing to the lowest common denominator

Failing religious institutions and religious organizations and institutions are desperately prostituting themselves in a vain attempt simply to survive. And like our cultural and political institutions our religious and faith institutions are appealing to the lowest common denominator in the attempt to get what they can and run with it. It’s not working, people, that’s why you see so many storefront and strip mall micro-churches flooding into the vacuum left by mainstream institutions. Problem is this: the storefront and strip mall micros are just as bad as the movie-theatre or stadium megachurches, because they create their own ideologies, agendas, idolatries and there are plenty of sheeple to participate because they don’t know anything better. Thanks Vatican II and interfaith dialogue, ecumenism. Lights, cameras, action! Worship!

I can speak from personal experience, scholarship, and professional activity with various faith traditions and communities, religious organizations and institutions, and educational institutions. As a writer, editor, researcher, and educator I vet my facts.

So where does an institution in decline turn in the desperate attempt to survive a couple of more years? St Patricks is prepping, even in the absence of its pastor for several weeks, for the celebration of the church’s centennial. 100 years is not a very long time in Church terms but it’s a start. The nagging question is how long does it still have before it’s converted into another empty building on Ravena-Coeymans’ growing list of vacancies. [Editor’s note: St Patricks have already sold off a number of real estate parcels, some of which were sold to RCS school board president, James Latter, the same James Latter who works for the Saudi Arabian-owned Sabic corporation, the same corporation who got recommendations for tax breaks from the RCS school district.] Maybe Mr VanDerveer’s off attending job interviews, since the parishioners in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany are usually the last to know when their church is closing.

When you can’t attract young men to the priesthood you have to attract old men to the diaconate

Like the consumer society they operate in, churches like St Patrick’s are compelled to sacrifice quality for quantity. For example, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany reports in a recent issue of Sheaf, the official gazette of St Bernard’s School of Ministry and Theology, the Albany Roman Catholic Diocese reports “200 deacons and growing.” When you can’t attract young men to the priesthood you have to attract old men to the diaconate. Numbers not quality count; that’s why the permanent diaconate was revived by the Roman Catholic Church in the 60s to stem the decline in seminary admissions; in many dioceses the diaconate has become a boy’s club, a church country club, an organization of narcisistic logrollers. “My dad the deacon.” “My son the deacon.” “My wife, Mrs Deacon!”

Deacon Chic Coming Soon to Your Parish! You have your church band, liturgical dancing, now you can have liturgical strippers! Don’t miss the Trinitarian Trio of Trollops!

The Episcopal church has been ordaining “women” for decades; many (mostly gender ambiguous specimens) in the RC church are advocating ordaining women deacons and the reasonable expected consequence of this slippery slope is women priests! When does this comedy of errors, this farce stop? [Editor’s note: For those of our readers with limited vocabularies, a “slippery slope” is a comedy of errors is a related series of amusing or farcical events involving a series of awkward missteps or other mistakes.]

Clergy or Special Ed Class or LGBT Rejects?

There is a big problem with erroneous teaching and that leads to gross stupidity and poor public image. Take for instance the Church’s stand on abortion and other issues. The corrupt and long discredited practice of prayer and what the faithful could expect from prayer as espoused by a greedy medieval Church led not only to Martin Luther’s confrontation and the ultimate schism but also to the Counter-Reformation, and later to many, many scandals. They still haven’t learned.

Erroneous teaching and that leads to gross stupidity and poor public image

OK. But can someone tell me how this works? How about you, Father?

Let’s face the facts: The Church may be facing annihilation over the longer term if it doesn’t (1) come up with some sort of recruitment scheme for the long-term future of the priesthood, and (2) come up with some sort of outside “support for its mission,” which translates into people who are able and willing to give in support of the Church in general and of their local faith community before it has to selling off more acreage. The old priests and nuns committed their lives and fortunes to the faith community; they’re gone now and so are their legacies. A liberal, liberation theology (= socialist) tainted Jesuit pope is not going to solve the problem; in fact, he stands to worsen it. Jesuits don’t have a very good record in Rome; Jesuit popes have an even worse record..

And this is how it’s gonna be!

One of the real problems being faced by the Church and by the faithful is that they are learning impaired. Change is not measured in years in the Church but in centuries. While the men in the Vatican are swilling good wine and dining in gardens al fresco, the American Church is making its own rules. Everyone seems to be caught up in a dead man spiral, stuck somewhere in an ecclesiological learning curve. But no one seems to be certain where they’re stuck.

Still in the learning curve. But where?

So that’s where we stand locally, and regionally. Ravena is just an example, a stereotype, and not the main culprit; Ravena is a symptom, we have to look for the ecclesiological pathology elsewhere. Meanwhile, the stupid signs aren’t helping.

A truly sad event occurred in the morning hours of April 25, 2017, when a young man died as the result of an unfortunate vehicular traffic accident. The event has been called “tragic” but we’d like to call it instructive and meaningful. Logan Penzabene’s death on April 25 was not just the loss of a son, a friend, a young man whose life would have been full of promise; it was a wake-up call to every single politician, law enforcement person, and every member of this bereft community and beyond. The roadside memorials will disintegrate, the tears will dry up, the body will be buried but will the problems and failures persist?

Watch what you do; take personal responsibility for things like this!

The media reports that “The tragic crash took place in the midst of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s teen safe driving campaign, and law enforcement babbles, and as Bethlehem Police Commander Adam Hornick babbles, “It’s even more unfortunate that we had this crash urging a campaign like this where we have such a concentrated effort by law enforcement to cut down on incidents like this.” Hornick hopes others will take the crash as a reminder to drive safe on the roads. Don’t we all?

Regardless of what Gov. Mario Cuomo puts out there politically or what Hornickmakes as a public statement on behalf of law enforcement, the fact remains, that many reports and complaints have been made to local law enforcement and to the New York State Police regarding the safety of vehicular traffic on Route 144, where this accident occurred, claiming the life of another young person and severely injuring another.

We made a direct complaint to New York State Police at the toll plaza 22 of the New York State Thruway…

In fact, several weeks ago, we made a direct complaint to New York State Police at the toll plaza 22 of the New York State Thruway regarding the very real and present problem of operators, including passenger vehicles and heavy commercial vehicles, running the stop signs at Rt 144. Details were provided to responding State Troopers but to date we have not been able to observe any police presence at the times we reported such activity nor at any other time.

The New York State Police seem to have plenty of money, personnel and time to escort oversized vehicles down Rt 144, even when commericial escort should be available and doing that service, but the NYS Police don’t seem to have time to enforce the vehicular laws of this state. People are endangered, injured and killed as a result. Why is that?

Know what this means?

We have repeatedly reported on the careless and dangerous operation of vehicles entering and exiting the Port of Coeymans and adjacent Coeymans Industrial Park properties but we have seen no enforcement action taken at that location. Illegal and dangerous passing by motorists when a slow-moving truck pulls out in front of them. Decoy cars parked unlawfully and dangerously on the roadside but no visible control of the heavy truck traffic. Why is that?

On Aprll 25, 2017, Logan Penzabene was killed when he crossed into the on coming lane of traffic. Why was that? What caused him to migrate into that other lane and strike the oncoming vehicle? Texting, using a phone, horsing around in the car? Didn’t take more than a second and it happened! Where are we, people? In LA-LA Land?

The Penzabene Accident Scene

On the one hand we can speak of our unrealistic notion that we are in control of events and that such things are preventable. That’s part of our LA-LA Land arrogance and is somehow believing in magic. Something that is preventable reasonbably leads to the conclusion that if it happened and was not prevented that some mistake was made, and if a mistake was made, someone obviously made it, barring any notion or proof of mechanical failure. In Logan’s case, complete failure of his steering wheel. So if the accident was due to human error, what was it?

Signs pointing in the direction of failure of programs…

While we, as human beings, are blasted into reality when such an event occurs, that reality regrettably lasts only until the memorial shrine disintegrates or a couple of days after the funeral. Then it’s back to business as usual. Here’s the stupid-rule: the more stupidity, more so-called tragedies. But the real tragedy is still the stupidity. The stupidity of educators, parents, law enforcement and policy makers. These events are not just deaths, they are evidence of failures but no one seems to think of these events as signs pointing in the direction of failure of programs. So the so-called tragedies continue.

It’s half-arsed damage control…

Quite frankly, it’s half-arsed damage control when the RCS school district plays the caring and compassionate student-centered educators by announcing that “grief counselors are being made available to students and staff in the Ravena-Coeymans-Selkirk school district. This follows the death of RCS grad, Logan Penzabene. He was killed in a car crash Tuesday in Selkirk.” Too little, too late And if RCS Superintendent of Schools Robert Libby sent a letter home with each student in the district informing families about the fatal accident Wednesday, he’s going to have to do a hell of a lot more than just sending students home with letters. But does he have any clue what to do?

Cuomo’ s public announcement of a so-called “teen safe driving campaign” isn’t going to do it. Hornick’s wishful thinking and so-called efforts to cut down on inicidents” like the Penzabene incident isn’t going to come to any fruition. Why? Because they are smoke and mirror shows, empty!

If efforts and programs worked, why is it, as Hornick reports, that “[T]he community has already been through this; the town has,” Hornick said. “This is the second fatal in town in six months.” Second “fatal” but what about the others, the non-fatal ones. If Hornick’s efforts were as colorful as his title, Bethlehem Police Commander, maybe we’d see some change.

In our May 3 article “Enuf already! Freaks and Scofflaws” we reported on a local business vehicle apparently operated by an employee of Eagle Tools in West Coxsackie. That report was provided on the very day of Penzabene’s funeral, on May 3! That truck ran a stop sign, was traveling at a low speed, was crossing over into the oncoming lane numerous times, never used a turn signal. And that’s someone allegedly with a commercial driver’s license!

And what about the rest of you? You’re all just as guilty! Just open your eyes while you’re driving and observe what’s happening around you, and the hazards and dangers being created randomly by your fellow vehicle operators. Better still, just count the hazardous and dangerous habits you have behind the wheel. Precious cargo on board signs merely obstruct visibility even if you were using your rear view mirrors; programs and efforts don’t work unless the community actively commits to the program and actively participates in the efforts.

What are you doing to ensure you don’t get that knock at the door or that telephone call starting,
“I’m afraid I have some bad news…”

This is not the time to start thinking…

It would also help if law enforcement did less talking and responded more proactively to real complaints and reports of vehicular misconduct and careless operation.

Cuomo is a politician and spends most of his time in a very secure environment, most of the time in New York City. We have to live in the community. We have to use the roads. We have to try to stay alive despite the stupidity of those around us. What to we do about stupidity? Well, you could start by being less stupid yourselves.

So forget all the empty “You’re in our prayers” crapola. Forget the roadside memorials. Forget the sentimental expressions of superficial sympathy. Forget Cuomo and his idiotic empty programs. And forget law enforcement efforts that are practically non-existent if we can judge by their response to real complaints and ongoing problems. Do something that is really effective: Mind your manners!

While human compassion blots out reason in the acute moments of such loss, and loss it is in myriad ways, and our heartfelt sympathy goes out to Logan’s devastated family and friends, we have to look at this event as having an incredible meaning for everyone: Logan’s death has become an icon, an icon that demands that we take responsibility for our own actions and accept accountability. If Logan’s death is to have any meaning at all, it’s up to his young friends, his community, and all of us to be responsible and obey our laws, take our time, be mindful of the moment, and to realize our duties and obligations not only to ourselves but to those around us as well. Period.

Celebrating the Zodiac of the Monkey in the Year of the Female Fire Chicken

We certainly hope so because here it comes!

We’re going to give the ghouls of corporate funeral services a rest for now as we collect some tidbits on the Albany County Coroner’s office and its scandalous dysfunction à la Smalbany.

But now let’s get back to our local heroes, our Town of Coeymans Police Department and our local town and village court justices. The upcoming articles are really going to knock your knickers off!

So here’s a preview of what’s coming up:

The Crandall Police Department a.k.a. Coeymans PD: No money to do it right but plenty to waste.Freedom of Information, Crimes Uninvestigated, No Arrests, and Dawn LaMountain Computer Illiterate

Local Police Working Together in Investigating Serious Crimes

The Coeymans Police Department has been dragging ass for two years now on various investigations, including some very serious crimes perpetrated in the Town of Coeymans. We have demanded records from the Town of Coeymans Police Department but must admit they have been very uncooperative in terms of working with us. Wonder Why? We were hoping the once Gregory “Dumplin'” Darlington and Gerry “Dirty-Hands” Delucaand his incompetent parasite partner, Cathy Deluca of failed fitness center fame, got the boot, things would change in Coeymans. Well some things did and others only got worse.

Once Dingbat Darlington and Dirty-Hands Deluca were out the door, the most egregious abuses went with them. But even when the ringleaders were booted, their minions were still on the job and old habits die hard. Right Jason Albert? Albert was handed an open and shut case against Cathy Delucaand flubbed it. He was rewarded with a promotion to detetctive. Business as usual in Coeymans. Cases are still being flubbed because the old flubbers are still on the force! That’s why they can’t close a case with an arrest and prosecution.

The other problem is that we’re still stuck with that incompetent racist P. David Soares in the Albany County DA’s office. He’s too busy pandering and politicking to prosecute any cases. If there were arrests in Coeymans we really have to wonder if Soares would have the brains to actually prosecute anything more than a traffic ticket or the guts to prosecute anyone with a Democrap party connection. Not very likely. Soares would much rather cherry pick his cases; he doesn’t want to come out looking like a monkey. Here’s the real test: When asked to spell the word “ethics”, Soares failed. He spells it “c-o-r-r-u-p-t”. Typical product of Albany Law School croneyism and Democrap affirmative action practices.

Staff of the Albany (NY) CountyOffice of the District Attorney

While Darlingtonand Deluca were violating protected civil rights and protecting their patrons, the McKenna PD is really limp on criminals. We thought P.J. McKenna, when he accepted the job, would clean out the dead wood from the department and start fighting crime. We had hoped that he would reach out to the New York State Police and the Albany County Sheriff’s Departmentfor support in cases where the Coeymans PD didn’t have the expertise or the wherewithal to make an arrest or to encourage prosecution. We were wrong.

We encouraged interdepartmental, interagency cooperation when investigating crimes in our community. Has that happened. The crime has happened but the cooperation hasn’t. The result is that we are all at risk because our elected officials and our public employees, with very few exceptions, are out for themselves and are not committed to the ethical performance of their duties and responsibilities to us, the public to whom they are accountable, whether they know, believe, or like it or not.

Dawn LaMountain, a parasite left over from the Darlington-Deluca mob, doesn’t have a clue about how to comply with demands for production of public access documents under the Public Officer’s Law or Freedom of Information Laws. In fact, she’d rather spend days, even months spinning her wheels and wasting time and resources, something Mr Phillip Crandall says are in short supply, that is, when it doesn’t apply to his cronies and his wild spending on consultants and assistants.

We are looking into the problem that Dawn LaMountain doesn’t know shit from shinola about how to use her computer, and gets defensive when she’s made aware of that fact. She’s also making more and working less than the Coeymans Town Clerk, who has duties and responsibilities that would require a staff of 10, but has to make do with one assistant and a part-timer. Tell you something about the Crandall mob?

Greene County Sheriff Gregory Seeleyand his band of chimps under the supervision of Greene County DA Joe Stanzioneare in the lineup, too. Seems they couldn’t investigate themselves out of a toilet paper roll if their jobs depended on it. Guess what Greg, Joe…Your jobs do depend on it.

We’ll be going through a recent F.O.I.L. demands for production of public access documents and information step by step, and you can make your decisions about the Coeymans Police Department and Dawn LaMountain. Out of their mouths they’re crying We got no money! but their actions seem to say they have plenty of time, materials and taxpayer dollars to waste (both in terms of poor management of resources, human and material).

We include the links above so that you have a clearer understanding of what we are and will be discussing in our upcoming article. As for Albany County District Attorney P. David Soares, please use the search feature on this blog to see what we have reported about that dumbass. There’s plenty on the Internet reported by authoritative and reliable media about that phony, if you’re interested.

Local Town and Village Court Justices

Our Own Retards in Robes!

Retards in Robes

We are going to be looking very closely at the New York State Unified Court System and the antiquated system of unqualified morons elected to be town and village justices.

Any lawyer with a half of a brain can piss down their legs and tell them its ice-water, and they say Yes! It’s ice-water.

Oh, that? It’s just ice-water.

We’re plagued with a bunch of substandard duds elected by their local friends and drinking buddies to administer a bizarre form of “justice” on the Town and Village courts throughout the state. Most of them barely have a highschool education, only a few have a degree, and very few have any training in the law. The basic qualification is a high school diploma, real or equivalent, the support of a local political party, and a handful of morons to elect them. FLASH!You now have a town or village judge who can really do some damage, and they do! Any lawyer with a half of a brain can piss down their legs and tell them its ice-water, and they say Yes! It’s ice-water. For years the state legislature has been trying to eliminate this circus of untrained monkeys but locals still keep the system, despite the long list of failures, abuses, mistakes, Neanderthals holding the office. They may have a courtroom or share a meeting room but in some parts of the state they may hold court in a barn or a garage! We have our own local species of ape-shit and we’re going to expose them for the monkey turds that they are. Stay tuned!

You may be very surprised at what we are going to be publishing about the retards in robes that you elect to administer an ignorant crapola version of justice that makes Judge Judy shite bricks, and has been in line for elimination for decades because of their abuses, lack of qualifications, and downright stupidity.

We’re going to be looking at how the Office of Court Administration has dropped the ball in supervising the courts and we’ll focus on some local town and village justices who administer anything but justice. Here are some of our picks for local ego-maniac, wannabe judges:

Joseph Farrell, New Baltimore Town Justice, Dirt-dumb, Alleged adulterer (high-moral values), voted in by local “friends”

Harold “Hal” Warner, Current Village of Ravena Judge, Former Albany cop disciplined for civil rights violations, Runs court with wife, village trustee witch-on-a-stick Nancy Warner, supervising, Known for stabbing former village justice Phil Crandall in the back

Phil Crandall, Current Town of Coeymans Supervisor, Disgraced Ravena Village and Coeymans Town Justice

Gregory Dardiani, Former Food Services Manager, Coeymans Town Justice, in treatment for blood disorder but still collecting his checks from the Town of Coeymans

Lee Davis, Third-class dyslexic dud attorney at New York Department of Health (the state of New York will hire just about any bottomfeeder misfit, it seems), Defeated New Baltimore Town Justice, even his own brother opposed his re-election

Tom Meacham, Incumbent New Baltimore Town Justice, Ethical Violations during his Campaign; no telling what violations he’ll commit while on the New Baltimore town court but we’ll know only when it’s too late

Leland E. Miller, Cairo Town Court, The Lawyer’s Justice, ignorant of law and procedure, tends to ask the attorneys for guidance regardless of which side they’re on

Make no mistake about it, these juicebags are real and retarded in the worst way. There are others we could add to this list, unfortunately many others, but we’ll stick with these clowns for now because they each represent a specific kind of ignorance, stupidity and corruption in this idiotic court system called the Town and Village Courts.

Given the reputation of these town and village justices, their lack of training and education, the fact that New York State has been trying to legislate them out of business, and the problems and suffering they have caused, it’s incredible that locals still elect these freaks!

We’ll critique and roast each of them individually and let you decide whether to lynch or tar and feather them, or, as some local morons put it, “He’s my friend. I have to vote for him.” Dumbass!

We snapped this inNew Baltimore Town Court — Or was it Cairo?The EditorOh, that? Just more ice-water.